Wednesday, 03 December 2008 21:43
We all have stories to tell.
True Story, Swear to God, as the title so aptly describes it, begins with a most unlikely meeting. The writer and illustrator, Tom Beland, is on a work assignment at Disney World in Florida. While waiting for a bus, he meets Lily Garcia, a talk-show host from Puerto Rico. They immediately hit it off. After their time at Disney World, he goes back to Napa Valley, she returns to Puerto Rico, and they continue their relationship across those thousands of miles.
When I read this book, I can't help but think of The Princess Bride. Toward the end, Prince Humperdink confronts Wesley saying,
You truly love each other, and so you might have been truly happy. Not one couple in a century has that chance, no matter what the storybooks say.
Just like Wesley and Princess Buttercup, I believe Tom and Lily found true love, that once in a century chance. Reading their story is by turns touching and hilarious. They have their ups and downs and disagreements and frustrations, with each other and their extended families, but they work it out, love, laugh, cry, and watching them do so is enjoyable, page after page.
It is also inspiring. Reading about Tom's efforts to publish and promote his story (as a mini-comic and later as a regular comic) made me want to go out, learn how to cartoon, and publish my own stories. (Granted, this might have more to do with my super-power, Delusions of Grandeur, than Beland's writing, but I don't think so.)
The illustrations are super clean, black and white, done in a cartooning style. Since most of the story involves people and their relationships, so do the illustrations. When the story focuses on the world outside people, though, Beland has the necessary chops.
By far my favorite part, though, is the writing. Beland does a fantastic job of showing moments of drama, sorrow, and humor. Although I never cried reading this, I have surely laughed, and not to myself, but guffaw-like outbursts. The writing is so good, in fact, that my wife actually started reading and, while I was collecting individual issues, she would ask every few weeks if a new issue had come in that she could read. That is truly a marvelous feat!
In the end, Beland accomplishes the extremely difficult job of writing and drawing his story in such a skilled way that the reader comes to love and care about his characters (in this case, real people), and miss them when finally putting the book down. The story is universal.
"Bravo", I say, "Bravo."
There are four volumes available. The first is True Story, Swear to God: 100 Stories (ISBN 193205121X). Published by AiT/PlanetLar, it collects the comic strip version of the story Beland wrote and drew for the Napa Valley newspaper he worked for before publishing his comic book. Each strip is one-off, with no story from strip to strip, but these are some of the funniest pieces Beland has written
The next three are published by Image Comics. These tell the story, from the beginning, that I talked about in my review. The first is True Story, Swear to God Archives Volume 1 (ISBN 1582408815). This is followed up with True Story, Swear to God Volume 1 (ISBN 1582407614) and True Story Swear to God Volume 2 (ISBN 1582409358). Unfortunately, as of this writing, it looks like Volume 2 is not currently available. Strange, considering it was only published a few months ago.
You can use any of the links below to buy from Amazon (I'll get a kick-back if you do).